Thursday, February 24, 2011

American workers want unions! Even the Starbuck people.

Americans strongly oppose laws taking away the collective bargaining power of public employee unions, according to a new Gallup Poll. The poll found 61% would oppose a law in their state similar to such a proposal in Wisconsin, compared with 33% who would favor such a law.

So why are the Republican governors in Ohio, New Jersey, Indiana, Iowa and other states considering similar laws? Got me. This will come back to haunt them.

And while we are on the subject of people wanting to organize, many Starbuck employees have been in the process of organizing through the Industrial Workers of the World. (IWW the Wobblies)

14 comments:

Anonymous
said...

The United State Post Office hasn't hired a career employee in over four years. The USPS is the second largest private employer in the US. This means the employees who have been hired in this time period don't get any benefits, guaranteed hours, holiday pay, commitments to become a career employee, or union protection; however, the employees can join the union and pay dues but get no real protection from the union. In addition, the temporary employees must give up their hours and days if the union members don't get their allotted hours. Why would the unions within the USPS agree to have new employees be hired in this situation for such a long time? This hiring practice is projected to continue into 2012.

Oh yeah, you can tell by the number of people organizing that people are dying to be in unions and pay dues. I was in O.C.A.W. years ago, before they allied with the Paper Unions, and we had an extra $5 a month taken out for over 20 years. When we were about to go on strike we found the fund had been used to buy a new office and re-roof it. The union dues are nothing more than cash cows for democrats and union leaders. If the unions care so much about each other why are union members at sawmills and every other processing facility forced to work alongside non-union workers at shutdown time and for repairs? It is because these agreements were cut to keep the money flowing into the union while screwing the worker. BTW, how did the union do for the workers at the pulp mill? Did you guys look out for their medical? Oh yeah, right...The union got their dues thats for sure.

Maybe someone can ask Jimmy Carter and the Democrats during his administration why they took away the Federal Employees right to collectively bargain. Maybe that's why Obama isn't down there marching with his supporters. Shouldn't Obama have done something about this by now, or at least brought it up?

Chris: Without the union and collective bargaining, we would not have been paid on average over $21 an hour at the Pulp Mill with Health Insurance paid. Period. Unions aren't perfect, and neither are corporations. You need both and a balance.

Individually you beg, united you bargain. There will come a time when workers will be pushed around enough to stand up and fight. Maybe in the very near future.

"The share of private sector workers who belonged to unions fell from close to 20 percent in 1980 to 12.1 percent in 1990. By the 2000s it had dropped to only 7 percent. Public employee unions grew steadily for most of the new unionization. It was difficult for governmental institutions to practice the kind of aggressive anti-union tactics that became the norm in the private sector since the 1980s. Not anymore."

"Using Wall Street's toxic waste dump of 2008 that produced high unemployment and budget deficits as their excuse, Republican governors and puppets of big business are deploying the same underhanded, union-busting tactics to gut public sector unions that business has long leveled against private sector unions."

"I cannot believe that in the 21st Century we are having this kind of a debate on the role of labor unions in this country. It isn't surprising since we have a new Gilded Age going on, with a new cast of Robber Barons like Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and the Koch brothers who have puppet governors in their hip pockets. What's next? Pinkertons shooting into crowds?"

What has Obama done to help the federal employees get the right to collectiverly bargain? And I guess Carter was a moderate, and the Congress was moderate when they took that away. And what about FDR and the founder of the AFL? They both agreed that public employees should not collectively bargain. Here's a little truth to ruin the BS about it only being Republicans that do this sort of thing.

There are good things that come from coolective bargaining. BUT, the corruption that goes along with the unions is out of control. As an example, during the last election there was video of union thugs, in uniform (t-shirts) roughing up (gang style)someone that had an opposing point of view.

And just where do you think the makers of the Soprano's series came u with their idea of what happens in unions.

A unionized public employee, a Teabagger, & a CEO are sitting at a table. In the middle of the table there is a plate with a dozen cookies on it. The CEO reaches across & takes 11 cookies looks at the Teabagger & says, "look out for that union guy, he wants a piece of your cookie."